My Wanhua Chemical Company English Class

Twice a week, Mondays 4-6pm, Wednesdays 4-6pm, I teach an English and culture class at Wanhua Chemical Company. They manufacture plastics. They always provide me with plastic bottles of spring water. Plastic is their main product, although I am sure they manufacture more than just plastic.

The class is 20 students, ranging in age, English language skill, but mostly in field of expertise. There are engineers, designers, businesspeople, salespeople, and administrators. During the first day, I divided the class into four groups; group 1 is the highest skilled English language group, and group 4 is the lowest skilled English language group. They are all proficient at using English to some degree, but they each have something they would learn more than they know. That is why they are in class.

I teach a course in English. For me, that means that I teach about American English and culture. After all, I am an American, and I have little to no knowledge of good Old England. So, I teach them about America. Last class, Monday's, I taught them a little about the American derision upon the word "need". In America it is commonly said that "nobody needs anything." I sometimes wonder why we have a word like that, a word that should never be used. I think "should" falls under that same category of words you may know, but never use. Why should I? Why do you need it? What do you need it for? Who says you should? Should and need just lead to a lot more discourse and a lot less getting things done. Perhaps it is better that way. So, as I defined the words laid out in the textbook, I also added cultural notes, as such. They seemed to enjoy it, and it seemed to have an impact on their comprehension of American speech and writing: language.

It is quite a worthy endeavor to extrude the meanings of words from the word itself, and to include culture into the mixture of meaning and definition. You cannot break a word down properly into subterfuge without breaking the words meaning, but if you care to, you can define the word a little more clearly.